The match officially began.
The map was chosen by Team Happy, so Mo Fan was no stranger to it. He immediately chose to take a roundabout route through the right path just like Ye Xiu did last match.
Huang Shaotian did the same as last match too, taking the direct path to the center. The only difference was that this time, Huang Shaotian wasn’t nearly as quiet as last match. As soon as his charactered loaded in, he began cheerfully chatting away with Mo Fan. Swoosh swoosh swoosh, words filled the screen, but not a single response came from Mo Fan, not even a punctuation mark or an emoji.
“Wow, so quiet! You’re not saying anything? Kid, don’t be nervous. Think of this as a normal match. Chatting is a way to relax!” Huang Shaotian was like a benevolent senior, kindly lecturing his junior. However, Troubling Rain’s Ice Rain told a different story as it glimmered from time to time. On the big screen, Huang Shaotian’s viewpoint was constantly shifting, carefully taking note of the sides of the road. No one had any doubts that the moment he met Mo Fan’s Deception, any sort of kindness would disappear.
After several of Happy’s matches, everyone had a certain understanding of the maps that Happy liked to choose.
The map layout was usually rather simple. There would be a wide path through the center, directly connecting the spawn points on both sides. It also served as a dividing line for the map. As for the left and right, or the east and west ends, consisted of two types of terrain. The north and sound usually had a certain symmetry to it.
For example, Huang Shaotian had chosen the middle path directly to the center, and there were numerous ambush spots along the road. Ye Xiu always took advantage of these spots, and Mo Fan took advantage of these as well.
“The two sides are getting close!” Pan Lin said. In these situations, a bird’s eye view of the map was usually displayed so that the viewers could see the two characters closing in.
“Which ambush spot is Mo Fan going to choose? To tell you the truth, I feel like Huang Shaotian has pretty much understood this map. No matter which side Mo Fan chooses to ambush from, it’s going to be difficult to surprise Huang Shaotian,” Pan Lin said.
“Yes, Huang Shaotian has chosen the central path like before, probably for this reason. He has a good understanding of the left and right side of this path. If he chose to directly fight from the east or west wings, there are probably gaps in his knowledge of the terrain there. As a result, it’s better to choose to fight in the places he’s most familiar with,” Li Yibo said..
“From what you’re saying, Mo Fan, who’s trying to ambush Huang Shaotian, is the one at the disadvantage?” Pan Lin said.
“If he insists on his current plans… but he should be aware of it. Even if he doesn’t have enough experience as a rooke, I believe the others in Happy would have reminded him,” Li Yibo said.
No one knew of Mo Fan’s personality other than those in Team Happy. From the matches, people could see that he didn’t like to talk, but how could they know that he was more quiet than even Zhou Zekai. It was like he was determined not to communicate.
As for what Li Yibo just said, Happy had obviously reminded him. Fang Rui, Su Mucheng, and so on all tried. In the end, they only got one word out of Mo Fan: Okay.
But as soon as Mo Fan started the match, he still chose to take a roundabout route and look for a spot to ambush Huang Shaotian. Happy’s Fang Rui had jumped to his feet when he saw it happen.
“This punk only knows how to act cold. He didn’t listen to anything I said!” Fang Rui shouted.
“He probably has his own plans!” Su Mucheng said. Mo Fan’s dislike for talking wasn’t fake, but he didn’t reject other people’s opinions. At first, he had been at heads with Ye Xiu, but his attitude towards him slowly changed. The others didn’t need to be said. If he didn’t want to listen to her and Fang Rui, then he would have just left instead of staying to listen. Even if all they got was an “Okay”, he definitely took their words seriously. Was Mo Fan the type of person who would elaborate?
“That punk, I wonder what he’s got in mind,” Fang Rui said.
The two sides grew nearer and nearer, but Mo Fan still hadn’t picked a spot yet.
“What’s wrong? Is Mo Fan not able to find the right spot because he’s nervous?” Pan Lin said.
“I feel like it should be because he’s not in a hurry to find a spot?” Li Yibo said, “It looks like he knows that his opponent has seen through the ambush spots along the central road, so he doesn’t plan on doing this sort of ambush.”
“Then why’d he bother taking the roundabout route?” Pan Lin said.
“He at least won’t get into a direct confrontation that way!” Li Yibo said.
“Okay… let’s keep watching,” Pan Lin said.
Five seconds later, Pan Lin suddenly thought of something: “Hey! Right, let’s take a look at Mo Fan’s equipment!”
“Of course!” Li Yibo slapped his forehead. He had forgotten too. Everyone had been completely absorbed into Ye Xiu’s pace that they forgot that Happy had upgraded their equipment. Quite a few of Lord Grim’s equipment had changed, what about Mo Fan’s Deception? When the characters loaded into the map, they forgot to check.
“Level 80!” The cameraman cut to a list of Deception’s equipment.
Silver equipment didn’t need to be clicked on. After all, the stats were all hidden. Only the name and the level were shown on the list.
The weapon was the most important, so it was listed first.
Ninja Blade: Sixteen Leaves.
“Sixteen Leaves, what a strange name!” Pan Lin mumbled. The Glory system automatically came up with the name for Silver equipment. Sometimes it would match the stats or the characteristics of the piece of equipment, and sometimes the meaning was more implicit and required more thought to understand the logic. All in all, the name didn’t mean much. However, it was unquestionably another piece of Level 80 equipment.
Deception’s Boots, Emblem, and Cape were also Level 80 equipment. He had fewer than Lord Grim, but it wasn’t anything strange for the core character to have more.
“Speaking of which, we haven’t really felt a difference in Lord Grim’s equipment!” Pan Lin suddenly thought. In the beginning, everyone wanted to know how much stronger Lord Grim would be with his set of Level 80 equipment, but after fighting three rounds, they didn’t see it giving Ye Xiu a huge advantage. Everyone felt like if Lord Grim didn’t have the upgraded equipment, the outcome still would have been similar.
“Lord Grim’s increase in attack power is very obvious. The minute changes in his other stats don’t seem as obvious right now. The bonus stats on the Myriad Manifestations Umbrella’s various forms isn’t clear either. As for the added-on skills, we’ve so far seen the Laser Beam from the Gun form and the Priest’s Wish Prayer.
“Ye Xiu… isn’t holding back, is he?” Pan Lin suddenly had a feeling, “The high-level skills tacked onto the Myriad Manifestations Umbrella make up the core of how he does battle. I believe that Team Blue Rain definitely wants to find out which high-level skills the current Myriad Manifestations Umbrella has, but in the end, Ye Xiu’s only used two. There’s too many that haven’t been used. Blue Rain can only be wary of them in the team competition,” Pan Lin said.
“That’s right,” Li Yibo nodded his head, “Ye Xiu won beautifully in the group arena, but the information he gave out was rather small. I wonder how much Blue Rain’s gotten out of it. But the skills added onto the Myriad Manifestation Umbrella’s various forms must be a headache for them.”
“Ah! Right now, Huang Shaotian’s Troubling Rain and Mo Fan’s Deception have passed by each other. Sure enough, Mo Fan decide to ambush Huang Shaotian,” Pan Lin returned to the match.
“Troubling Rain’s movements have become more careful. It looks like Huang Shaotian is very clear as to what possible ambush spots there are in his surroundings. Hm? Coach Li, if that’s the case, then when they first started, for a length of time, it wasn’t possible for him to ambushed, yet if I remember correctly, Huang Shaotian had still been carefully taking precautions!” Pan Lin suddenly became doubtful.
“That wasn’t taking precautions. That was him giving his teammates more information on the map!” Li Yibo said.
“Oh, so that’s what it was. It really makes you feel like they’re a very attentive team!” Pan Lin sighed.
“Yes,” Li Yibo said.
On the battlefield, Troubling Rain had rushed past Deception’s coordinates and continued to push forward. As for Deception, he began quietly heading to the edges of the central road as if he wanted to choose an ambush spot.
“Is he planning on acting out when Huang Shaotian retraces his steps after not finding anyone?” Pan Lin guessed.
Li Yibo shook his head but didn’t say anything. He had no idea what Mo Fan was planning.
“What exactly is this punk thinking?” Let alone Li Yibo, even Mo Fan’s teammates, who had a better understanding of Mo Fan, were wondering the same thing!
But then afterwards, Mo Fan still didn’t choose a spot. It was just that after moving along the edges of the central road, he began running towards Troubling Rain.
“Is he trying to do a back attack?” Pan Lin wondered.
The back was the biggest dead angle. It also came with bonus damage, so circling around to the back to mount a sneak attack was the most advantageous option. But because of this, pro player would always be on guard for their rear, especially in 1v1s without any teammates to rely on and when no information was known on the opponent’s position.
“I hope he’s not just planning on sneaking up from behind… Huang Shaotian is on guard against it,” Ye Xiu said.
“Yes, when he looks left and right, he can also see behind him out of the corner of his eye. Even though he’s not looking carefully, it’s more than enough as a precaution against back attacks,” Fang Rui said.
Hearing their worries, Chen Guo suddenly became nervous. Seeing Deception catching up to Troubling Rain, she really wanted to jump over there and yell in his ears “Be careful! Don’t go up like that.”
“You punk, where are you hiding? You’re so patient! You’re still not going to show up?” Huang Shaotian said.
“It’s been so long already. Do you want a yellow card? Referee, give him a yellow card!” Huang Shaotian continued to type.
The yellow card immediately appeared. To Huang Shaotian.
“Uh…” Huang Shaotian didn’t retort and defend himself. He already knew why he had been given the yellow card.
This was the playoffs, not the All Stars. Even if the referee knew that he was just joking around, trying to lead the referee to make a call was absolutely an offense. As long as it was attempted, the player would definitely be penalized.
“Look, I ate a yellow card for you. Why don’t you hurry up and come out?” Huang Shaotian didn’t dare mention the referee again and started typing madly towards Mo Fan.